Water

Water

Conaway Praises EPA Repeal of WOTUS, Calls for Continued Work to Protect Farmers and Ranchers

“WOTUS has never been about clean water, it was about feeding the Obama EPA’s insatiable appetite for power. Well that ends now.”

Washington, D.C. – House Agriculture Committee Chairman K. Michael Conaway (TX-11) praised the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) announcement today it is repealing the Obama administration’s waters of the U.S. (WOTUS) rule and called on other agencies to revise and re-evaluate their enforcement of this onerous provision. Following the EPA’s announcement, Chairman Conawaymade the below remarks:

For close to a decade, Republicans have been leading the charge against the regulatory onslaught on coal communities. But now, with an ally in the White House, we can finally begin to roll back some of the punishing regulations of the last eight years. This starts with repealing the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM) Stream Protection Rule under the Congressional Review Act.

The final SPR, forced on the American people in the waning days of the Obama administration, is a blatant attack on working families in coal country that could shut more coal mines and send thousands of miners to the unemployment line. The final rule jeopardizes at least one-third of this nation’s good paying coal jobs and removes half or more of total U.S. coal reserves from future extraction. Let’s put that in perspective for a moment: The rule’s associated job loss comes on top of the loss of 68,000 good paying coal jobs over the past few years.

Helena, MT – Governor Steve Bullock issued an executive order today declaring a statewide natural resource emergency for Montana water bodies due to the detection of the larvae of invasive aquatic mussels at Tiber Reservoir and suspected detections at Canyon Ferry Reservoir and the Milk and Missouri rivers. The signing of the Executive Order triggers the deployment of an interagency rapid response team to respond to the emerging situation.

“Aquatic invasive species are a serious threat to Montana’s critical infrastructure and economy. The deployment of the multi-agency rapid response team will work quickly to identify and contain existing mussel populations, and prevent future introduction to other water ways,” Bullock said. “The potential economic, ecological and recreational impacts for Montana and our region must be addressed quickly and every effort must be taken to prevent the additional spread of this threat.”

September 12, 2016 - Today, House Agriculture Committee Chairman K. Michael Conaway (R-TX) delivered remarks on the House floor to draw attention to the negative impacts of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Army Corps of Engineers’ overburdensome regulations are having on farmers, ranchers, and rural America. Watch the video and view the official remarks below.

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) - The U.S. Forest Service is six years overdue on creating boundaries and management plans for two wild and scenic rivers in Northern California and the threatened wildlife that live there, fishermen and environmentalists claim in court.

The Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations and North Coast Rivers Alliance sued the Forest Service, the Department of Agriculture and Mendocino National Forest Supervisor Ann Carlson in Federal Court on Thursday.

They claim the Forest Service violated the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act by failing to create boundaries and management plans for the Black Butte River and its tributary, Cold Creek, by the 2009 deadline imposed by Congress.

Congress adopted the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act in 1968, requiring that lands and waters in the Wild and Scenic Rivers System be managed to preserve their free-flowing condition, water quality and environments "for the benefit and enjoyment of present and future generations."